Ira Glass

Mike Daisey episode prompts more exacting standards

(Newser) -
The furor over Mike Daisey's semi-fabricated Foxconn story has NPR rethinking its content—even when it comes to comedy. Humorist David Sedaris' hugely popular stories are now in the spotlight for autobiographical material that he has described as "realish." Before the Daisey brouhaha, This American Life "...
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Performer 'failed to honor the contract with audiences' in Apple exposé

(Newser) -
Mike Daisey, the writer/performer at the heart of a controversy over the Apple exposé that proved riddled with what he later termed "theater," is now contrite for his fabrications, reports the LA Times . The man behind the one-man-show The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs, apologized on...
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Drive-time deejays know how to tug heartstrings and egos into paying up

(Newser) -
If you listen to public radio, you’ve come to dread it too, writes June Thomas in Slate; at least twice a year, the airwaves are dedicated to fundraising, with broadcasters plying listeners with New Yorker subscriptions and tote bags in exchange for a few bucks. Thomas studied the pleas...
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Radar makes funny at the expense of Ira Glass' popular franchise

(Newser) -
This American Life, providing "a valuable census of liberal America's cultural consciousness since 1996," comes in for a little ribbing from Walker Boyd in Radar. Boyd spoofs Ira Glass's radio and TV narratives with a Mad Libs-type story generator. Now "your dreams of Ira narrating some touching...
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Second season debuts tonight

(Newser) -
The stories on the small-screen version of “This American Life” start out small—a husband’s protest over the oppressive American trend of lawn-mowing, a young man living with spinal muscular atrophy—and become something universal, both dark and light, even a little magical, writes Heather Havrilesky on Salon....
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Masses won over by Bell's 'Letterman' style

(Newser) -
Bible-thumper Rob Bell wears geeky-hip glasses, once aspired to be David Letterman, and was momentarily poised for rock stardom, reports Time magazine. And he may be "one of the most important 21st Century Christian leaders," according to one biblical scholar. Nine years ago, Bell founded a nontraditional church...
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Site counters People with its own list of high-functioning hunks

(Newser) -
With only the the briefest nod to that other Sexiest Men Alive list, Salon offers its second annual alternative compilation of hot guys—proving that it all depends on what the meaning of hot is. Jon Hamm, Ira Glass, Jacques Pepin, Judd Apatow, and 22 others make the cut. And...
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How do you make beloved public radio program This American Life work on TV?

(Newser) -
Stevenson Swanson wonders how and weather Chicago Public Radio god Ira Glass can really do a television show and, even more daring, a show for the premium cable only network, Showtime.
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